West One Loans, the specialist property lender, has today announced that it will lend up to 5.5 times income on its core product, up from five times income for purchases and remortgages across all product credit tiers.
The group said this was due to its desire to make homeownership more accessible for those who are not adequately served through traditional lending products.
The uplift to 5.5 times loan to income (LTI) has also been applied to Right to Buy purchases, but does not extend to shared ownership products, which have recently received their own improvements instead.
Marie Grundy (pictured), managing director of mortgages at West One Loans, said the improvements do not affect the higher LTI limits available on Extra products.
She added that the specialist lender had also made improvements to its automated valuation model (AVM) criteria for residential mortgage customers, with the enhancements being exclusive to its remortgage offerings.
These changes are designed to speed up remortgage journey for brokers and their clients and are applicable to all Core products from the Premier, Platinum and Prime Plus plans.
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The maximum loan size eligible for an AVM has increased from £300,000 to £500,000 and the maximum loan to value (LTV) has risen from 70% to 75%. West One Loans’ underwriting team will run the AVM during the early stages of the application process and will advise brokers directly on whether a case can proceed without a physical valuation, removing unnecessary delays and keeping cases moving.
“Our aim is to make the remortgage process as smooth and efficient as possible for both brokers and their clients. The improvements to our AVM criteria will complement our innovative free fast track legal remortgage process, which also includes the acceptance of electronically signed mortgage deeds, meaning more customers can benefit from a faster, lighter-touch process,” Grundy stated.
West One Loans is one of the UK’s largest non-bank specialist property lenders. Operating through offices in Watford and Manchester, it manages over £2.1bn in assets and targets its lending at individuals, landlords, and businesses whose needs are not met by traditional high street banks.
Shared ownership overhaul
The lender announced last month that it was overhauling its criteria for shared ownership products with the introduction of Premier and Platinum ranges for borrowers with stronger credit profiles who may fall outside high street lending criteria.
West One Loans has also extended its LTI Boost product to interest-only borrowing up to 75% LTV. Elsewhere, the lender has amended the criteria for self-employed contractors registered under the Construction Industry Scheme (CIS), now enabling them to evidence income using the latest three months’ payslips, invoices or statements alongside SA302s and tax year overviews.
Other changes include its criteria for family concessionary purchase options, enabling the borrowing of up to 100% of the discounted purchase price, as long as the loan does not exceed 80% LTV. This is alongside existing criteria, which allow borrowing up to 95% of the discounted purchase price up to the maximum plan LTV.
